Email Messages and Instant Messages

You can send email messages and instant messages from within the Info Center. You can also set up email templates. Email templates insert database fields into an email message's subject or body. These fields are then replaced with actual data when the email message is sent.

The email features are available in the Employee, Contact, Lead, Project, and Opportunity Info Centers.

The contents of the Organize Options dialog box for email templates, and thus the procedures that you use to create and save email templates, depend on your Email Template Organizing security setting on the General tab of the Roles form in Security Configuration.

When to Use Standard Email Messages

Vision’s standard email functionality is efficient because only one email is sent when you click Send, and all other recipients are copied on that one email.

You might use standard email functionality if:

• You do not want to use database fields in the Subject or Message fields of the email.
• It is appropriate to send only one email to all addresses (To, CC, BCC), rather than a separate email for each record selected in the Records field.
• You want to use the content of the email message one time, and you only want to send it to one contact, lead, or employee.

When to Use Template-Based Email Messages

When you use template-based email messages, every recipient in the Records field of the Email Templates dialog box is sent an individual email. Then everyone in the Emails fields on the To, CC, and BCC tabs receive one email per recipient in the Records field.

For example, you select ten records in the Records field. Then you select one record in the Emails field on the CC tab. When you click Send, each one of the ten recipients in the Records field receives just one email, which contains merged data specific to that individual.

When you use database fields, Vision makes each email unique by merging different data into each email. Refer to the following examples of when to use email templates rather than standard email functionality:

• You want to send the same email to multiple people and you want to use fields from the database in the Subject or Message fields. For example, if you want the email to include a database field for an employee’s first name. For example, “Hello [Contacts.First Name].”
• You want to include database fields in the email and you want to use the email repeatedly to send email messages to different employees, leads, or contacts.